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Internet Security
What
Is Phishing? How Do I Avoid It?
Phishing is a word that is used to describe
a very specific type of Internet fraud and identity theft.
In phishing, a con artist will use what appears like
a legitimate email from a reputable source uses a fake email. The idea is
to get you, the user, to give out your personal or financial
information. Once the scammer has such information from you,
he can use it to empty accounts, run up charges on your credit
card, and even clone your identity completely to take out loans
and skip out on the payments leaving you with the beat up credit.
So how do you avoid these scams? There are five simple steps
you can take to keep yourself from falling victim to phishing
scams.
Do
not ever respond to an email that has seemingly come from
your credit card company, bank, or other financial institution
with which you might have a relationship. There are many phishing
scams out there that will use these emails. They will say that
there is a problem with your account and that to fix it; you
must click on a link they send you. They will even go as far
as to threaten you with closing the account or calling the
credit bureau on you if you ignore them. No matter what you
will not want to click on any links. Don’t call the number
they offer you either. Instead, call the number you usually
do for the bank and talk to someone there. Tell them about
the email and what it asks you to do. In almost all cases,
they will tell you it is a scam and will thank you for letting
them know about it. The people who put together phishing scams
are sly with their emails, so always double check with your
financial institute any emails that you get from them requesting
information or asking you to click on a link.
Secondly, keep
private personal information just that; private. Do not ever give out your bank account information, credit
card numbers, PIN numbers, social security number, or any personally
identifying information to anyone asking for it via email.
Legitimate companies understand the need to keep personal information
private and will never ask you to email such information. In
addition, if a company has issued a PIN for some reason, they
will never ask you to reveal that number to any of their employees.
Anyone who would for any reason need to know that information
will be able to get it from the system. Phishing scams are
counting on your willingness to give such information over
email, so simply don’t do it. If for some reason a company
you work with is asking you to do that, then you may want to
consider finding a different financial institute with which
to do your business.
Do
not ever click on the link in an email to buy something. The email may very well look like it came from a department
store you use. However, many phishing scams actually take real
URL’s and change them ever so slightly to make them look like
the real ones. To protect yourself, if you see something in
an email that asks you to click a link to buy it, type in the
URL yourself. If it is a department store with which you are
familiar, then type in the URL you usually use to work with
them, if you don’t know it then look it up. By not clicking
in the email, you can very simply save yourself a very big
mess.
Fourth, report
emails you find to be phishing emails. When
you get one that is imitating a bank or business, forward that
email to the institution. Most banks or companies will have
a postmaster@ their URL as an email to receive these reports.
The companies will often be able to warn other customers or
even track down and pursue action against those responsible.
Lastly, if you get a phishing email and it really worries
you, if it is one that seems particularly threatening or seems
to be working on a broad scale, then report it to the Internet
Crime Complaint Center. It is a government agency that is a
joint project between the FBI and National White Collar Crime
Center. They can help to shut down or prosecute those who are
particularly threatening. # # # # #
SolveYourProblem.com : 2007
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